State Representative Phillip Miller, D-Essex, at The Preserve in Old Saybrook as part of the effort to make the public aware of the need to protect this unique resource. Credit: Robert Lorenz.

Mission

The mission of Connecticut Fund for the Environment and its program, Save the Sound, is to protect and improve the land, air and water of Connecticut and Long Island Sound. We use legal and scientific expertise and bring people together to achieve results that benefit our environment for current and future generations.

At A Glance

Year of Incorporation1978

Organization's type of tax exempt statusPublic Supported Charity

Organization received a competitive grant from the community foundation in the past five yearsNo

Leadership

CEO/Executive Director Donald S. Strait Esq.

Board Chair Johan Varekamp PhD

Board Chair Company AffiliationWesleyan University

Financial Summary

Projected Revenue$2,690,877.00

Projected Expenses$2,690,863.00

Statements

Mission

The mission of Connecticut Fund for the Environment and its program, Save the Sound, is to protect and improve the land, air and water of Connecticut and Long Island Sound. We use legal and scientific expertise and bring people together to achieve results that benefit our environment for current and future generations.

Background

CFE is the leading advocate for the environment in Connecticut, using education, coalition-building, advocacy and litigation. CFE programs directly affect the seven million estimated current residents and visitors to the State of Connecticut, Long Island Sound and coastal New York. Founded in 1978 by Fred Krupp, current head of Environmental Defense, CFE merged in 2004 with Save the Sound, a respected voice for the protection of Long Island Sound’s shoreline and marine habitats. Save the Sound is now a distinct program within CFE. The merger enhanced both programs, bringing together Save the Sound’s proven stewardship, restoration, and community outreach capability with CFE’s legal, scientific and policy expertise. Our strategies include advocacy, litigation, stewardship and habitat restoration, based on careful research and analysis. Our work is carried out with thousands of partners and stakeholders, including elected officials, community leaders and citizen volunteers. CFE has a dedicated staff of 20, plus four student interns. Key to our success is building and mobilizing coalitions. Along with our more than 9,900 citizen e-activists; 5,550 members region-wide; and 2,500 volunteers; we also partner with other environmental organizations, community groups, businesses and other non-profits. Currently, our unique and powerful partnerships include Transit for Connecticut, Growing Connecticut Around Transit, the Clean Water Investment Coalition and the Climate and Energy Solutions Action coalition. In addition to advocacy, CFE is mentoring a new generation of environmental leaders. Our attorneys teach a seminar on public interest advocacy techniques and skills and we also apprentice law students through the Environmental Law Clinic that we founded in 2004 as part of the University of Connecticut’s School of Law. CFE also awards one fellowship a year to a graduate student in law or science. This year we are actively working to: protect endangered lands; clean up and restore Long Island Sound; expand energy efficiency and clean energy programs in Connecticut; ensure more livable communities through increased transit, transit-oriented development and green infrastructure; challenge toxic polluters of our rivers and the Sound; restore habitat, clean up beaches and river fronts; and advocate for increased funding to curb pollution from aging and insufficient stormwater / sewage management systems.

Impact

2013 was another successful year for CFE and its program Save the Sound. We helped secure $1 billion for Connecticut's Clean Water Fund to help towns pay for much-needed sewer system upgrades. We continued our efforts on several land conservation projects, including protecting the 1,000-acre forest known as The Preserve in Old Saybrook, Bethel water company lands that were at risk, as well as endangered lands in Litchfield County. We continued to expand our habitat restoration program, installing a new fishway with "fish cam" on the Pequonnock River in Bridgeport. This project will engage children and families as citizen scientists in monitoring fish passage and gathering data for use by the CT Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. We rallied 2,400+ volunteers to help clean more than 16,000 pounds of trash from 50 miles of beaches. We installed nine rain gardens to reduce pollution from stormwater runoff in the Town of Southington. We launched our western Long Island Sound program, initiating a water-quality monitoring program in Mamaroneck, which led to the discovery and remedy of two major contamination sites. We worked with state lawmakers to improve Connecticut's Comprehensive Energy Strategy and protect the Renewable Portfolio Standard. We continued to advocate for the New Britain-Hartford busway (CTfastrak) anticipated to be completed in 2015, which will help ensure cleaner air and smarter urban development patterns.

Goals for the current year include hiring an executive director for our Stamford 2030 project and working to meet the criteria for the Stamford 2030 District, a collaborative program to engage building owners in pursuing district-wide energy, water and transportation emissions reduction goals in that city. We anticipate celebrating our Pequonnock River restoration at Beardsley Zoo, and engaging the public in installing native plants as part of the restoration effort. We will begin work to remove Pond Lily Dam on New Haven's West River which, with our earlier West River project, will open 10 river miles to migratory fish passage. We also expect to host a planting event and undertake the next phase of restoration at Sunken Meadow State Park--a high-profile project that has extended our restoration reputation across the Sound. We expect to begin removing a hazardous dam in Mystic, CT to improve safety of the downstream community and enable migratory fish passage. We anticipate opening a new Save the Sound Mamaroneck office to better protect Long Island Sound and extend our efforts to reduce hypoxia and beach closings in the western Sound. For more than a decade, CFE has worked with multiple allies toward an agreement to allow a conservation purchase of the 1,000-acre property known as The Preserve. That agreement was reached last year. We will conduct outreach and communications events to advocate for raising the $10-12 million required for the conservation purchase of the property. We will continue working with multiple allies to protect Plum Island (an 840-acre jewel of mostly undisturbed habitat for threatened wildlife species and native plants just off Connecticut's shore that is at risk for public sale and development) and toward that end will focus on strengthening the Preserve Plum Island Coalition and laying the ground work for a possible public acquisition of the island by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. We expect to coordinate 40+ Connecticut coastal cleanup events as Connecticut coordinator for the International Coastal Cleanup (ICC). As part of our Green Infrastructure program, we will work to develop a 100% engineered design to inform the creation of a suite of low impact development best management practices to reduce stormwater runoff from two acres of impervious walkways, plazas and roofs at Bridgeport's Housatonic Community College into Long Island Sound.

Needs

General operating and program support.

Matching funds, which are required for us to obtain government grants for government grants.

Donations to support our work to clean up Long Island Sound.

Gifts to our Strike Force Fund, which helps to fund emergency efforts, such as our current work to save Plum Island or our past successful effort to stop Broadwater, a massive 20-story natural gas plant that was proposed by Shell Oil for Long Island Sound.

Members and activists to support and participate in our program, legislative and advocacy efforts.

CEO Statement

Our organization is indebted to the efforts of citizens like you.

With your help, we've been able to stem multiple threats to our state's land, air and water. We've achieved tangible results through legal and legislative advocacy and through citizen engagement. These results include helping to win passage of the Global Warming Solutions Act, which put Connecticut among a handful of states (California, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, and New Jersey) that have committed to concrete carbon reductions in a specific time frame. As of this year, we have completed 22 habitat restoration projects with a broad spectrum of partners, including Federal and state agencies, municipalities, other nonprofit groups and local volunteers. Our restoration statistics are impressive: 73 river miles opened up to fish passage, 432 acres of lake habitat improved, 322 acres of restored tidal marsh, and 25 acres of native vegetation installed. We permanently protected 15,000 acres of lands that purify our drinking water. And over the last ten years, more than 17,000 volunteers joined us to remove nearly 140,000 pounds of trash from 500+ miles of Connecticut beaches and riverfronts.

Practical solutions to safeguarding Connecticut's land, air and water require many levels of expertise. Our staff of lawyers, scientists and outreach experts does the tough work of finding solutions that work. We then bring those solutions to our state legislature, state agencies and the courts.

Our successes also require teamwork. We form alliances with citizens, scientists, advocates, community groups, engineers, unions, businesses and other diverse groups. For example, we know there's a long way to go if we want to clean up sewage overflows and restore the low oxygen "dead zone" in Long Island Sound. So we've joined forces with towns, engineers and the construction industry to convince the state to invest in the Clean Water Fund to finance major sewage projects designed to clean up our rivers and the Sound and to create jobs at the same time.

Most importantly, though, Connecticut would be a very different place without your contributions and support. We cannot clean up beaches, win legislative battles or restore a river without you. Your continued moral and financial support for our work to confront the threats to our land, water and air and to Long Island Sound make all the difference. Please join 9,900 of your fellow citizens who take the time to make a key phone call to an elected official, or the more than 2,500 volunteers a year who join a beach cleanup or habitat restoration planting. Thank you.

Board Chair StatementFor more than 40 years, CFE has been a respected and impressive force for protecting the land, air and water of Connecticut and Long Island Sound through innovative solutions, collaborative achievements, solid science, committed advocacy and, when necessary, strategic litigation. Environmental issues take many years to resolve. Someone has to push back to defend the wider interests of the community -- someone who is in the fight for the long haul. Thanks to your support, Connecticut Fund for the Environment and its program Save the Sound have fought and won on critical issues to protect public health and preserve our environment like:

• Blocking Broadwater -- a massive 20-story natural gas plant that would have dominated the skyscape of Long Island Sound for decades to come;• Persuading the State of Connecticut to protect all 18,700 acres of the Kelda water company's lands and reservoirs in a $90 million purchase by the State and The Nature Conservancy; and• Successfully advocating for Connecticut's adoption of the strictest tailpipe emission standards for cars, and a requirement that new cars offered for sale be labeled with their greenhouse gas emission values.

While we’ve waged these big battles, we’ve also made steady achievements like restoring dozens of river miles and acres of lake habitat, native vegetation and tidal marsh through our habitat restoration program, and removing nearly thousands of pounds of trash from Connecticut beaches in a decade of serving as Connecticut coordinator for the International Coastal Cleanup.

CFE/Save the Sound more than makes up for its relatively small size by having BIG impacts. We aren't afraid to tackle major environmental issues or large, well-funded corporate interests that disrespect environmental values. Your investment in this organization helps ensure that we are here to use our tremendous legal and scientific expertise year after year. Thank you for your support and your faith in our mission.

Every year more than 2 billion gallons of raw sewage are dumped into Long Island Sound and its tributaries, closing beaches and shellfish beds. In addition, much of Long Island Sound is plagued by a low-oxygen dead zone caused by excess nitrogen that threatens the health of fish and other wildlife. Our State of the Sound report released in early 2012 concluded that the western Sound is particularly vulnerable to hypoxia, a condition in which low levels of dissolved oxygen make parts of the Sound uninhabitable for marine life.

Through our Western Long Island Sound program, we work to safeguard the health of residents and Long Island Sound, protect marine life and help keep our beaches open in the summer. Pollution in the Sound knows no boundaries, so our work to protect our region's natural treasure takes place in both New York and Connecticut. Our goal is to ensure that all of Long Island Sound is swimmable and fishable for everyone. To that end, we work through the courts to ensure that sewage treatment plants in New York meet their nitrogen-pollution reduction targets established by the EPA and the Clean Water Act. Last year, we initiated our citizen-based water quality monitoring program to identify and eliminate sources of bacterial pollution. We also launched our Sound Swim Alert system that lets people know when it's safe to swim at their local beach and we started a youth education program that helps young sailors understand the need to protect the Sound. In 2014, we will open our Save the Sound Mamaroneck office to address the needs of the western sound. We will also expand our citizen-based water quality monitoring program to identify sewer pipe leaks and reduce bacterial pollution draining into the Sound. We'll continue our work to keep citizens apprised of actions they can take to protect the western Sound, strengthen our Youth Education program and continue to monitor progress in reducing nitrogen discharges from sewage treatment plants.

1) We ensure that there is state and federal support for specific projects that benefit Long Island Sound - annual funding for the Clean Water Fund, and federal re-authorization of the Long Island Restoration and Stewardship Act, for example.

Long term success: our rivers, lakes and Long Island Sound are clean and restored: Marine wildlife can prosper throughout Long Island Sound because the low oxygen dead zone is healed; all of our rivers and lakes support aquatic life; our beaches, rivers and lakes are safe for swimming.

Connecticut law mandates that our state’s energy needs must be met first by reducing energy demand through efficiency whenever doing so is cost-effective, rather than by increasing the supply of energy. Improving efficiency makes sense. Buildings that are well-insulated and weatherproofed are warmer in winter and cooler in the summer. Saving energy also means that power plants generate far less of air pollutants like nitrous oxide and sulfur dioxide, thereby protecting public health and improving quality of life.

As part of our Climate and Energy Program, in 2014 we will launch our new Stamford 2030 project, the goal of which is to create and build up a vibrant business-based organization to promote energy efficiency, resiliency, and other key issues in commercial, institutional, and major multi-family buildings in a defined district in Stamford, Connecticut. Based on the model created by Architecture 2030, known as a “2030 District," the project will establish a collaborative organization that engages building owners in the district to lead the way on reduction goals for energy and water usage, and transportation greenhouse gas emissions. As part of our 2014 outcomes for this new project, we will hire an executive director and work to meet the criteria for the Stamford 2030 District, looking to already established, groundbreaking 2030 districts in Seattle, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Los Angeles and Denver. We will also work to create a structure to address the climate change consequences of leakage from natural gas distribution systems; and advocate for sound measures to create and meet climate and clean energy goals established by the Global Warming Solutions Act. Through this program, we will work to establish Connecticut as a leader in energy efficiency and climate change mitigation.

1. CFE led a successful effort to permanently protect 15,700 acres of utility-owned water company lands, the largest single land conservation purchase in the history of Connecticut. 2. CFE intervened as a legal party before the Connecticut Public Utilities Regulatory Authority in its review of a proposed merger between Northeast Utilities (“NU”) and Massachusetts-based NSTAR. As a result, we were able to win NU’s commitment to donate conservation easements on four parcels of land, totaling approximately 1,000 acres, to a land trust for permanent conservation.

3. Working with the legislature and local partners, CFE stopped a mining project on water company lands and curbed an overly intensive residential development on watershed lands, both of which posed a threat to clean drinking water supplies.

4. We helped to pass legislation making it more profitable for private water companies to preserve land than to make it available for development.

This program encompasses our work in Green Infrastructure and Habitat Restoration. Stormwater runoff is one of the most serious water quality problems facing Connecticut municipalities and Long Island Sound. With each rainfall, water runs off roofs and pavement, causing flooding and sewage overflows and carrying pollutants to our rivers and Long Island Sound. Implementing green infrastructure techniques to trap, filter and infiltrate stormwater can help. As part of our Green Infrastructure projects, we installed 9 rain gardens in Southington last year. In 2014, we are working with municipal officials in Bridgeport to install a series of green infrastructure projects that will reduce the harmful effects of stormwater runoff from two acres of impervious walkways, plazas and roofs at Bridgeport's Housatonic Community College, setting the stage for the state's first large-scale green infrastructure project.

With 10 percent of the U.S. population living within 50 miles of Long Island Sound, it's no wonder many marine habitats have become degraded and even lost. Through our habitat restoration work, we seek to open or repair fish migration runs (and track fish movements to ensure they are using new fish passages) and restore tidal wetlands and marshes to increase the quality and health of ecosystems and allow native plant, bird and other species to return. Critical benefits of habitat restoration include flood protection, water quality improvement, carbon sequestration, higher property values, tourist revenue and job creation. As of this year, we have completed 22 habitat restoration projects with 73 river miles opened up to fish passage, 432 acres of lake habitat improved, 322 acres of restored tidal marsh, and 25 acres of native vegetation installed. In 2014, we anticipate working on habitat restoration projects in New Haven and Mystic, Connecticut and in King's Park, New York.

Between 2011 and 2014, we will engage a diverse group of organizational partners and local volunteers to complete six major river restoration projects and engage 250 people in hands on restoration activities associated with habitat restoration projects.

We will restore the ecological function and value of rivers and marshes in the Long Island Sound watershed, as a result doubling the number of migratory fish species returning upstream to their historic spawning grounds. By 2020, our goals include:

· 150 miles of rivers currently blocked by dams are opened;

· Restore or protect 2,000 acres of coastal habitat;

· Support new menhaden and river herring conservation rules;

· Support the listing of river herring and American eel on the endangered species list.

Examples of Program SuccessHelpOrganization's site specific examples of changes in clients' behaviors or testimonies of client's changes to demonstrate program success. In June, we celebrated in New Haven the completion of the largest urban tidal restoration project in all of New England; partners included city, state and federal agencies as well as the Friends of Edgewood Park. Staff and 50 volunteers planted more than 6,000 native marsh and wet meadow herbaceous plants.
With state and federal partners and the Quinnipiac River Watershed Association, Savethe Sound celebrated the completion of a fishway project at the Wallace Dam on the Quinnipiac River in Wallingford in April with a dedication and planting event with 80 volunteers.
As of June 2012, the Habitat Restoration program has completed 20 projects, restoring 72 river miles, 400 acres of lake habitat, 24 acres of native vegetation and 171 acres of tidal marsh.

This program seeks to protect Connecticut's critical open space lands, islands and beaches. In 2014, we will be working on urgent campaigns to protect two remarkable areas from looming development: the 1000-acre Preserve, located in Old Saybrook, Essex and Westbrook; and Plum Island, an 843-acre island in eastern Long Island Sound that is a breeding site for threatened birds and home to the largest seal haul-out in southern New England. We will also continue to organize 40+ beach cleanup events.

For more than a decade, CFE led the fight to prevent The Preserve from being developed into a luxury housing development and golf course. In 2014, we will continue our efforts to protect the Preserve by assisting partners in raising the funds needed to secure a conservation purchase, which, if successful, will make this unique property accessible to the public for hiking, bird-watching and other forms of recreation.

Located off Orient Point, N.Y., Plum Island is home to the Plum Island Animal Disease Laboratory, a high-security federal research center whose top-secret presence has resulted in the entire island remaining largely off-limits to humans, creating a de facto wildlife refuge. The federal government has decided to move its laboratory out of state and plans to sell the island. In 2014, we will continue our work to strengthen the Preserve Plum Island Coalition and lay the groundwork for a possible public acquisition of Plum Island by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

2013 was our 11th year of serving as Connecticut Coordinator for the International Coastal Cleanup. In 2014, we anticipate coordinating 40+ beach cleanup events to help keep our beaches and river waterfronts safer, more attractive and free of debris.

Given the continuing tough economic climate and limitations on funding, our first objective is to maintain current funding and service levels. Other Other short term objectives include: State legislation that maintains and improves transit service; State legislative initiatives to identify new funding sources for transit, and using revenue from increased bus and rail fares to improve service.

Attendance at transportation/transit-oriented development public events and forums; expansion of express bus and commuter services; increase in existing inter-regional services; increased membership in the Transit for Connecticut Coalition.

Examples of Program SuccessHelpOrganization's site specific examples of changes in clients' behaviors or testimonies of client's changes to demonstrate program success. During the past year, we helped ensure that a previously passed 4 percent increase in bus and rail fares slated to go into effect in 2013 was eliminated. CFE also helped ensure that funding was included to increase bus service in New Haven and add night service in Waterbury and that a new budget line, the Transit Improvement Program, was created to help planning for TOD, improve service and increase bike/pedestrian projects.
In the past our Transit for Connecticut coalition helped procure an increase in operational funding for bus service as well as $20 million in bus infrastructure investments and $70 million in stimulus funding for super clean hybrid buses. We supported two major projects that are now moving forward: the New Haven-Hartford-Springfield rail line and the New Britain/Hartford Busway. We won modest new funding for bus operations; limited cutbacks to bus transit service during the economic downturn and raised awareness of the agenda for responsible growth and transit-oriented development.

Transit-oriented development (TOD) is a proven economic growth and environmental protection strategy that combines housing, employment, amenities, and recreational opportunities within close proximity to our transit stations and away from green fields. It adds value to the communities that embrace it, preserving the landscape and improving quality of life. The goal of this program is to ensure that Connecticut's primary growth is directed toward livable, walkable, bike-friendly and transit-centered communities. Without a well coordinated, collaborative transit-oriented development (TOD) effort, Connecticut stands to lose a major opportunity for economic development and the critical environmental gains associated with a reduction in vehicle miles traveled. For example, use of TOD along transit corridors in the Hartford metropolitan area could reduce climate changing pollution as well as smog and soot by 25 percent. In 2014, we will continue working with state agencies, legislators, towns, regional planning associations, developers and others to develop a shared game plan to spur transit oriented development in Connecticut.

Examples of Program SuccessHelpOrganization's site specific examples of changes in clients' behaviors or testimonies of client's changes to demonstrate program success. CFe convened a coalition that led the fight resulting in a cap on greenhouse gas emissions in Connecticut, making our state standards some of the strongest in the nation. This 2008 landmark legislation sets economy-wide reductions in carbon emissions of 10% below 1990 levels by 2020 and 80% below 2001 levels by 2050.In 2009, we helped pass legislation that provides a tax credit to developers who build green buildings, thereby ensuring that there is a strong incentive to make new developments efficient right from the start. In 2011, we successfully advocated for the creation of standards for televisions and other home electronics to combat "vampire draw" -- the electricity that many modern gadgets use whenever they are plugged in, despite being turned off.

CEO/Executive Director

Donald S. Strait Esq.

Term StartJan 1992

Emaildstrait@ctenvironment.org

Experience

Don Strait is the Chief Executive Officer of Connecticut Fund for the Environment. He has served in his current leadership capacity at CFE since 1992, and was Legal Director from 1990 to 1992. In 2004, Don guided the organization's merger with Save the Sound. Prior to joining CFE, he was a staff attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council in New York. Don was one of the co-founders of the Connecticut League of Conservation Voters. He serves on the board of directors of Restore America's Estuaries, based in Washington, D.C., and the Greenwich Land Trust. He is a graduate of Amherst College (B.A. 1981) and Harvard Law School (J.D. 1985).

Collaboration is key to CFE's success. Along with our more than 9,000 e-activists and 5,550 members region-wide, we also partner with other environmental organizations, community groups, businesses, unions, municipalities and other non-profits. Currently, we convene and coordinate Transit for Connecticut, Growing Connecticut Around Transit, and the Climate and Energy Solutions Action coalition and we co-coordinate the Clean Water Investment Coalition. CFE/Save the Sound is also developing a partnership with the City of Bridgeport to implement green infrastructure in that city.

Comments

CEO Comments

The senior management team includes the President and CEO, the Executive Director of Save the Sound, the Director of Development and the Director of Green Projects. The management team meets bi-weekly and reports back to the Board and staff about challenges and opportunities. The management team reviews the strategic plan routinely.

Foundation Staff CommentsThis profile, including the financial summaries prepared and submitted by the organization based on its own independent and/or internal audit processes and regulatory submissions, has been read by the Foundation. Financial information is input by Foundation staff directly from the organization’s IRS Form 990, audited financial statements or other financial documents approved by the nonprofit’s board. The Foundation has not audited the organization’s financial statements or tax filings, and makes no representations or warranties thereon. The Community Foundation is continuing to receive information submitted by the organization and may periodically update the organization’s profile to reflect the most current financial and other information available. The organization has completed the fields required by The Community Foundation and updated their profile in the last year. To see if the organization has received a competitive grant from The Community Foundation in the last five years, please go to the General Information Tab of the profile.

Related Information

Stewardship of our natural resources is essential if we wish to guarantee that present and future generations enjoy clean water, good air quality and open spaces. When you support organizations that protect the environment you address immediate need today while ensuring a greener tomorrow.